[Wyrd bið ful aræd]

I read somewhere that they were told to expect north of 50% casualties -- I don't know if that's true, it seems odd that soldiers would be told such a thing going into an operation, but in any event they weren't stupid, they knew that "Fortress Europe" was bristling with defenses, they knew what happened at Dieppe...And even so, there was no mass insubordination, there was no desertion. They simply went.

To this day, there is no exact count of how many men died on D-Day. It was such a chaotic bloodbath that it was impossible to even attempt to make accurate records until days later, when more men had died and gone missing and been wounded in further combat actions.

[wastoute]

Not to denigrate the men but it is pretty hard to run to the rear in an LST...

[Oatka]

I read somewhere that they were told to expect north of 50% casualties

I talked to a WWII vet who said he was told the same thing, and in the innocence of indestructible youth, he and the others looked at each other and said "You poor bastard".

[sidebar] I'm reading "D-Day" by Stephen Ambrose (again) this week and decided to fly the flag today.